


Trust Yourself

by TheXWoman



Category: Star Trek: Voyager
Genre: Diary/Journal, Episode: s03e15 Coda, Gen, POV First Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-03-26
Updated: 2007-03-26
Packaged: 2018-05-18 12:41:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 514
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5928898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheXWoman/pseuds/TheXWoman
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lost out here, thousands of lightyears away from anything we have ever known, our guts are all we have. </p>
            </blockquote>





	Trust Yourself

**Author's Note:**

> Challenge: Someone on Earth once said: "Trust in yourself. Your perceptions are often far more accurate than you are willing to believe." Do you think this is true? If not, what do you believe?

__  
Captain's log, stardate 7403.26

So much of being a captain is about your gut instinct.  It's something that comes with the job.  It's something that they can't teach you about at the Academy.  There is no requirement for "Trust Yourself 101" in command school.

Lost out here, thousands of lightyears away from anything we have ever known, our guts are all we have.  Our perceptions of the species around us.  We have learned the hard way that leaving ourselves unguarded and ignoring our gut instincts is often dangerous and deadly.  We are here in the Delta Quadrant, suspended in foreign space, hoping to make an ally or a friend along the way.  But the truth is all we have is ourselves.

Yet it almost cost me my life today.  Staring Death in the eye - Death that wore the face of my father - and I almost lost sight of myself.  I wanted to believe this man; the man who had been there for me for so long, the man that I had lost so suddenly 15 years ago.  I wanted to crawl into his arms like I did as a child, let him tell me it would all be okay and that I was strong enough to overcome.  But his arms were too open, his comfort too willing; there was something foreign about the way he looked at me when I told him I wasn't ready.

My gut told me I wasn't through on _Voyager._   And I almost didn't listen.  But that pull to these people... my crew, my family, pushed me away from the alien disguised as my father.  And it saved me, in the end.

But even through overcoming it, the knowledge is still there: I faltered.  I have before, and I will again.  And whose life will be in my hands the next time?  Mine, or another's?  Chakotay, or Tom, or B'Elanna.  Harry, or Tuvok.  I have made mistakes in the past, ones that have cost me dearly, so how is it that this time is the one that has brought me the most doubt as to what I am capable of?  How easy it is, out in this strange space surrounded by invisible enemies, for one to don a mask of assurance, trust, and love, and for us to quickly forget ourselves.

There is no doubt in my mind that it is our perceptions that guide us more truly an accurately than anything that can be grasped from outside ourselves.  But the danger still lies in the hope; the hope that, as we hang on the lip of the precipice, the alien hand that reaches out to us, not matter how much our heart tells us not to trust it, may in fact pull us to safety.  And it is then that we must take the risk to ignore our hearts and reach out, or let go and hope that there is safety below. 

We know that in this world of invisible enemies and faceless foes, the only ones that we can truly trust are ourselves.  Yet the hope remains.


End file.
